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Lot o' Hotpot: Three Travellers
Shanghaiist wound the clock back a few years yesterday afternoon at the New Jiangwan City SMP Skate Park (the biggest in the world!) watching a scarily young posse of locals and laowai get around a massive series of concrete bowls and ramps on skateboards, inline skates, BMXs, motorbikes and scooters. There were plenty of t-shirts with statements, lots of spills, some impressive frontside-180-nosegrind-to-fakies, and far too many members of the local constabulary considering the modest size of the crowd.
The main event of the day was the Second Annual SMP Shanghai Showdown, a series of competitions (categories included “vert”, “jam” and “freestyle”) featuring international skateboarding stars. Last year’s champ Neal Hendrix was among the lineup of talent. Who won? Not really sure: the vibe was friendly rather than competitive, to the point where it was hard to work out when one contest ended and another started.
One thing we do know is that everyone was “stoked” to be taking part in the event. That is to say, everyone who got anywhere near the roving microphone made sure they used that particular word -- especially the Aussie motorbike riders who managed to construct entire sentences using no other English language expression. One announcer even claimed -- with an angry tone in his voice -- that he was “stoked” to have lost his mobile phone, suggesting the word has now transgressed its original meaning.
Having dabbled in skateboarding as a teenager (enough to talk with some authority about "trucks"), Shanghaiist was also stoked to be at the SMP event -- it was an action-packed afternoon.
If only the skate park were a little closer to the city centre … To get there we walked to the Jiangsu Lu metro, took the train to People’s Square, met a friend outside an office building, walked across to Line 1, travelled three stops to the Shanghai Railway Station, shuffled forever up a long underground tunnel to Line 3, took the elevated train right to the end of the line, walked half a kilometre to a waiting shuttle bus, waited for more people to get on the bus, drove for 20 minutes to the park, and finally took our seats.
It's a great thing that locals now have somewhere to skate, but like Shanghai's fancy new tennis centre, the Maglev stop, Pudong International Airport, and the city's nearest hill, does it have to be quite so far away?
Also on Shanghaiist:
Shanghai’s new skate park is REALLY big
Lords of Bogtown
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http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Southeast_Asia/HJ06Ae01.html
I went to that. I still skate despite being 30+ now. Willy Santos was there, such a nice guy too. And Rune Glifberg and Bucky Lasek. People skating in the early 90's may remember Neal Hendrix doing the Jackass thing on the Newdeal videos way before the latest crop of 'gnarly dudes'. Specifically eating sh*t and jumping in the open sewer.
Johhny Tang won the 'Amateur' street comp. Odd since I belive he's 'Pro' for Gift. The fact that I ride his name model deck would seem to back that up. I think that comp was more 'local' than 'am'.
The park is amazing but, like the article says, is miles away. It's been 8 months since I decided to take up skating again and this was my first trip there - toooooo far. And no public transport too. They put on a shuttle bus at the end of the day, to get back to Jiangwan Town station. But two shuttle buses going back and forth on a major event day with hundreds (maybe a slight exagerration there) of people in attendance - work it out. We all left at the same time.
It's nice to sit up top of the ramp and look around - fields and the lake, clean(er) air. Soon the planners here will get the order right - access and then site.